Qualla: Silvertown Tunnel

Silvertown Tunnel: Introduction

Tue, 19 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Cnbrb, CC BY-SA 4.0. The tunnel boring machine had a name: Jill, after Jill Viner, the first female bus driver in London. She started cutting south from Silvertown towards Greenwich in September 2022, an 11.87-metre cutting head grinding through the silt and gravel under the Thames at a careful, methodical pace. Two and a half years later, on 7 April 2025, the Silvertown Tunnel opened to traffic. There was no opening ceremony. Transport for London simply switched on the toll gantries at 6 am and started charging. Within hours the protests had begun.

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Image: Cnbrb | CC BY-SA 4.0

Silvertown Tunnel: Why East London Needed Another Tunnel

Tue, 19 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Sludge G, CC BY-SA 2.0. The arithmetic was simple. Downstream of Tower Bridge there were four road crossings of the Thames - the Rotherhithe Tunnel from 1908, the two bores of the Blackwall Tunnel from 1897 and 1967, and the Dartford Crossing some 16 miles further east. The Blackwall northbound tunnel h...

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Image: Sludge G | CC BY-SA 2.0

Silvertown Tunnel: The Cost of Convenience

Tue, 19 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Dankarran, CC BY 4.0. The price tag started at £1 billion in the 2015 consultation. By March 2020 it had climbed to £1.2 billion. In 2021 a Private Finance Initiative of £2.2 billion was secured to cover construction and 25 years of maintenance - after which the tunnel would transfer to TfL at zero co...

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Image: Dankarran | CC BY 4.0

Silvertown Tunnel: Tolls That Bought a Backlash

Tue, 19 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Grim23, CC BY-SA 4.0. Tolls began the morning the tunnel opened. Cars: £4. Motorcycles: £3.50. Larger vehicles: £8.50. Same rates applied to the previously free Blackwall Tunnel from the same day, which solved one political problem - why charge for the new tunnel but not the old one - and created seve...

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Image: Grim23 | CC BY-SA 4.0

Silvertown Tunnel: The Mass Trespass

Tue, 19 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Grim23, CC BY-SA 4.0. On 25 April 2025, eighteen days after the tunnel opened, approximately 1,000 cyclists rode into the southbound bore as part of a Critical Mass ride. The tunnel has no pedestrian or cycle access - a shuttle bus service for cyclists is provided instead, which campaigners regarded a...

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Image: Grim23 | CC BY-SA 4.0

Silvertown Tunnel: Opposition Across the Spectrum

Tue, 19 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Turini2, CC BY 4.0. Few infrastructure projects unite politicians the way the Silvertown Tunnel did. Andrew Boff and Zac Goldsmith opposed it from the Conservative side. Siân Berry, Jonathan Bartley and Caroline Russell from the Greens. Lyn Brown, John McDonnell, Rokhsana Fiaz and Matthew Pennycook ...

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Image: Turini2 | CC BY 4.0